Online Tasting Announcement + 2003 Michele Chiarlo Barbera d'Asti

In the words of Professor Farnsworth, "Good news, everyone!"

I'll be hosting an online wine tasting for my hometown newspaper, The Commercial Appeal. It's an event held every Thursday night at 7:00 Central Time. On March 12 I'll be popping the cork on a bottle of the 2006 Redheads "Yard Dog" Red, a mostly Petit Verdot blend from Australia. Local readers should be able to find this in shops all over town for around $12. For my readers from outside the Memphis area, I don't know how widely it's distributed. Just look for the ugly, mean-looking dog on the label, but feel free to drop in if you want to give a shout-out.

My advice is to have a pulled pork BBQ sandwich ready for enjoying with the wine. If you can't find such a thing in your area or make it happen in your kitchen, don't forget the tortas or tacos al pastor of your local Hispanic neighborhoods. It's even better if you can find a Cuban place that makes a medianoche or some good lechon asado. Let me make it simple: find some flavorful pig to go with this wine.

I'll post a link the night before the tasting... Hope y'all can make it!

For a completely unrelated wine review that wasn't long enough for a full post, here's a nice little bottle from Italy:

The 2003 Michele Chiarlo Barbera d'Asti hails from Piedmont way up in the Northwest corner of Italy. 100% Barbera, $15, 13% abv. Vegetal, asparagus nose with a little black pepper. Black cherry and strawberry flavors with medium tannins and a dried fig aftertaste.

I served this with a braciola that didn't quite look good enough to show here. It tasted great, but I really didn't get the neat spiral cross sections you see in the food magazines. Plus I discovered that pounding out a flank steak becomes problematic in a house with dogs--as much as they may enjoy the random bits of meat that end up on the floor, the loud hammering isn't pleasant for them.